The minor factions offer a unit and either a boost to your units or cities. They also give you a worker from each village in the region to the city. You first have to pacify the villages. To do this you can attack them, bribe them or if you have the parley skill, perform a task for them. Once they are pacified you can assimilate a minor faction from a region you are in control of and that has been pacified. You do this in the main empire screen. You can train another two skills later that allow you to assimilate another minor faction for each skill. You can train the unit for each assimilated minor faction. It is quite important to choose the right ones..Broken Lords can pick the centaur, which will give them the unit. But the food boost would be wasted. Usually the villages give you a boost for each village controlled. So choosing a faction that has three villages in your territory would give you 3x the boost of a faction that only had one village.



If you attacked the village, you will also be have to rebuild it in the city to get the little worker in your city. A couple of races also offer further uses for minor villages..this bit I'm not positive about so don't take as read. The Cult allows you to convert minor villages once they are pacified. This will give you a unit every 15 turns and the FIDSI from the ring of tiles around the village that are in the village's region. You will also receive 1/10 of the regions resources every turn. The Necrophages get extras from minor villages as well. One food and a production with skills. The Necrophage heroes also get boosts and skills that affect what you get from villages..maybe someone could clarify?

One minor amendment: Bribing them, along with Parley, also requires the "Language Square" technology. But early game you don't have that much dust anyway, so it's not worth bribing - better off using it for governor-heroes. (Actually, I rarely ever bribe unless playing Cultists, for a quick conversion - you're more often limited by Influence than Dust in the expansion phase). The extra resources and technologies from minor faction Parley quests can be quite good though, but the quest objectives and rewards are completely random, so it's not really something you can plan. You just get lucky.

Antistone wrote:


Faction Selection

If one of the factions looks especially fun to you, you should probably play them. But if you don't know what to pick, in my estimation the easiest faction to start with is probably the Wild Walkers

[...snip...]

Pretty good guide, but mainly dependant on the selected faction, since there are many aproaches to this. This is my proposal for the Broken Lords faction:



BROKEN LORDS:



BL's don't need food, and that alone (for me), makes them a better option than Walkers as a first race choice (still, walkers have a better starting military unit, those Dekari Rangers are nasty with bows)



Turn 1: Same as OP, split and search, but instead of Food/Production locations, search for / locations, with RIVER tiles as secondary choice (see hero upgrades). is more important than .



Turns 1-20: Settle in, immediately assign your BL hero as governor. Keep exploring and by the time you get your next settler, you should already have found a good location for expansion.



Hero upgrades: First ability to learn is one point in Aquatic Dust (probably useless unless you settled near a river location), and next three points should go straight to Dust Diviner (here comes the party), finally work straight towards Dust Trickery. Think of hiring a Cultist hero, they're just utterly broken right now as gobernors.



Tech Research: Should start with Empire Mint, then both Geomic Labs and Public Library (order depending on the amount of science around your city, Public is usually better since does not require building afterwards, but geomic may net more science in some specific tiles like Tundra), then you must chose if you want to play a "Broken" lord military rush (yes, this tactic is awfully "broken", specially against AI) or a more static economy-based empire. In rush cases, you want Marketplace, Furnace (check if you have nearby glassteel/titanium deposits) and both Era1 Alloys and Armor, then anything else to reach Era 2; in a more static empire, you may research Foundry, then both Open Pit mines and Furnace.



City upgrades: First of all, try to buyout opulation: if available unless you're saving for something else. Assign opulation: with this priorities in mind: > > / (you want 40 by turn 20 - 1st empire plan -). As for improvements, start with Memorial, continue with the Empire mint (should have been researched already), then both science buildings. Broken Lords usually do NOT build/train, they just buyout everything when they have the chance. You just want to get some production on your cities because it reduces buyout costs every turn on the current building/unit produced. Burroughs is OK as long as you get extra dust out of them (still, burroughs are expensive to buyout so you'll probably have to keep them some turns in "normal" production). Then, if you go for military rush, get some titanium/glassteel extractors if available (try not to buyout them, since they only pay for themselves in the long run) or just keep saving Dust; in case you go for a static development, keep expanding with burroughs and buyout a settler.



Empire Plan: You want 40 influence by turn 20 when you can establish the plan, and you want to enable both +3Dust/pop and +20% science plans; the military one (+20% cost reduction on units) is decent if you go for military rush, but not needed.



If possible, settle your second city after you establish the plans (each city increases the plan costs, so you want to settle AFTER you establish), unlike OP Walker's pattern, you do NOT want to reasign your hero because your first city will have several more pop working on dust gains, and if your hero has got some Dust Diviner levels, is granting your first city extra dust gains per every pop working on dust gathering, so until yor second city gets some pop, you're better leaving your hero in the first one, since you'll get more dust that way.



Turns 21-40 This will depend on your tactic



Militaristic Rush: Develop your second city like the first one (Empire mint, Library, labs...) and keep saving dust, you're in "hibernation mode" until you reach Tech Era 2.



Once you reach Teach Era 2 is when the fun begins:



1-. Immediately research Imperial Coinage, then go for Shipyard in case it's an island map, if not, either research Prisoners, Slaves, and Volunteers (buyout cost reduction), The tier 2 titanium/glassteel weapon/armors (in case your armies weren't tanky enough already), or Meritocratic Promotion (+2 size on armies)

2-. Hire a new Commander hero (you didn't hire earlier because of Dust unkeep, one extra unit is better than one extra level on your commander at this point).

3-. Create new versions of your base units, equiped with T1 glassteel/titanium weapons and armor.

4-. Buy enough glassteel/titanium for your military needs (available from the marketplace once Imperial Coinage is researched). If you have created some extractors, you will already have some mats, but both titanium/glassteel start with a mere price of around 20d, so for a rush is better to just pay for the mats you need than building (buyout) the extractors, that may cost 300-400 dust a piece (so extractors only pay for themselves in the long run, you should only go for extractors if the game stabilizes).

5-. Buyout one or two heavily armed 4unit armies (you didn't buy them earlier because of Dust unkeep), if you still keep your 1st turn units, retrofit them, then assign your commander to one army .

6-. Keep both armies nearby so they reinforce themselves, then go play one-sided war. Most cities at this time will drop to zero defense in 2 turns maximum (they'll usually have 100-160 defense max). You may split both armies, but sieges may last a little longer and another militaristic empire may give you some trouble.

7-. Remember to heal up all your heroes/armies involved in a battle, that's a major pain for all other factions since you start each new turn with a fresh army, while other factions must slowly regen.



If you go more static, (mainly an economy victory-based empire) or the game stabilizes, research Prisoners, Slaves, and Volunteers first (it's just that good for BL's), Then Imperial Highways if you have several cities (Dust and Science? It rings a bell...) and follow with Glory of Empire or Central Market f you need aproval. Remember that your base order is almost always > > /



Turn 40+. You should know the drill already; if you're going militaristic try to enable both "+20% unit production cost reduction" and "+30% Attack on units" Empire plans along with the old ones. +2 vision is also good at this point. In case of a more static approach get "+25% building buyout reduction" instead of the attack on units. Take note that in the long term "+33% building production cost reduction" is better, but reducing flat buyout cost makes easier to purchase buildings a little earlier than waiting one or two extra turns for the buyout costs of them to drop. Still, both are good choices.



If you're going militaristic, think of just RAZE captured cities not located in good / spots. BL's don't have anything to do in forests or lush grasslands. Those cities are just a waste of resources and rating, so just burn them to the ground (this also sometimes make the AI waste turns building another settler and trying to resettle... with a 100 defense city... , if you're bringing reinforcements to your main armies, have some crappy unit take a detour and kick that matchbox city down); just keep on lookout for any anomaly, or tundra/rockylands. That's where real men/lords settle.

So I've played a bit with the Cultists and I tend to steam roll everyone in around era 3 or 4 (even in MP, although I've only played a few games). Here are some things I do in the beginning that don't overlap with the generally good advice above.



CULTISTS:



Turn 1. On the first turn I retrofit my Preachers with +1 movement. Scouting and parlaying with as many neighboring regions as possible is crucial. I send the preachers off in two similar directions in the hope that they can meet up later, and the hero goes off by himself. The secondary goal (after pacification) is to level up the hero, so hit ruins and parlays and if you can on turn 2 or 3 (while still in the region), get the hero +1 movement as well.



Turn 2-20. When you reach a point where you'll have to fight something or minor factions might pop, warp your hero to the preachers and gather up. Try to pacify and convert as much as possible. Level up the hero as a governor and try to get a 2nd hero asap. I tend to get a Empire Mint and Mercenary Market immediately after Mill Foundry for this reason. As soon as you can afford the 2nd hero, or if you have bad luck and can't risk exploring anymore yet, send the hero to govern. It is also worth delaying the hero to buy a merc if you need to fight something nasty for a pacification quest (for example, buy some haunts to fight some demons).



I almost always get a Wild Walker as the 2nd hero for the movement speed. You can't afford to lose your one and only city, so the movement speed is critical just in case (although the AI is not smart enough to counter attack in my experience). Another good 2nd hero is the Drakken for the extra reinforcement positions (handy with massive amounts of units).



When converting, prioritize good units (haunts, ice wargs, demons) and good village locations. Remember that each village costs -10 Dust per turn (IIRC), so hopefully it will pay for itself. If you get bad units, sell them instead of leaving them in garrison and buy some good ones or upgrade your faction units. Don't be afraid to put some population on Influence sometimes, especially leading up to the first empire plan, since you need 20 for the first convert (even on fast mode).



Turn 21 and Beyond. If all has gone well, before you know it you will have more units than you know what to do with. In my last game by era 3 I had 3 full stacks with heroes and I was sieging multiple capitols at the same time. Don't worry too much about upgrades (except the archers). Cultists value quantity over quality. If you have two full stacks, they can reinforce each other and overwhelm pretty easily. You'll want heroes with the +exp skill for leveling up the units you can't retrofit. As soon as you can, start getting the faction archers and put 1-2 in every stack.



I hope this helps some beginner Cultists!

One thing to add there, mshelley, is that if Exid the Chosen is available when you recruit your second hero, then you damn well recruit him regardless of the presence of any Wind Walker heroes and stick him in your city, never to leave it again. You can always go for a Wind Walker as your third hero in that case, and it might not take all that long to save up for your third hero, since you can sell your first hero to cover part of the costs.

I recently had a conversation with a friend who was struggling to find reliable opening strategies for Endless Legend and asked me some of the things I do. I thought I'd turn this into a forum post in case anyone else is in a similar boat.



The following are patterns I've noticed I seem to fall into in the early part of the game. I don't claim to be a world expert and I don't promise these are the best possible openings, but they seem to have done OK for me (I've beaten "endless" difficulty), so if you're struggling to get started, maybe they'll help you.



Note that this is a strategy post, not a user manual: I'm going to assume you already know the basic game mechanics and how to navigate menus and such. Also note that my experience comes from playing single-player with all settings except difficulty at default.





Faction Selection

If one of the factions looks especially fun to you, you should probably play them. But if you don't know what to pick, in my estimation the easiest faction to start with is probably the Wild Walkers, for the following reasons:

• Industry bonus on forests and hero
• Starting location biased to favor food and industry (relative to other factions)
• Faction quest seems to align well with the sort of things you would do at that stage of the game anyway
• No special disadvantages
  
  

Obviously, if you're playing as some faction with special rules that would significantly impact the advice below, you may need to make some modifications (e.g. Broken Lords aren't going to need food buildings).





Turn 1

Split your military units off your starting army, one at a time, and send them scouting in different directions so you know the best direction to send your settler in.



There are many possible considerations when choosing a city location, but in my experience the determining factor is usually the number of anomalies in range (if playing as Drakken, ruins are also important). Most regions seem to have at least one potential city location that is within range of 2 or more anomalies. It's probably OK to delay founding your city by one turn if you can see that it's going to get you an additional anomaly.



If you can search ruins with your hero on your first turn, the extra 10 XP is a nice perk, but don't delay founding your city or compromise its location to get them. After that, reassign your hero to your city as a governor.



Start building a Founder's Memorial. You can assign your worker to food if it reduces the number of turns before a population increase, but when in doubt always assign workers to industry: industry will usually be the bottleneck on your development, and buildings or hero skills that raise industry usually raise it less than similar buildings/skills raise food/science/dust, so getting it from workers is a good deal.





Turns 2-20

Send your military units scouting in different directions. Your main goal is to identify good locations for new cities, but also explore ruins along the way. Once you have the necessary technology, also try to parley with villages you run across; if you later build a city in that region, this gives you a head start on pacifying the villages, and occasionally the quests will offer useful rewards even if you don't build in that region.



The first nine technologies I get are (not necessarily in this order):

• Mill Foundry (building: industry)
• Seed Store (building: food)
• Public Library (building: science)
• Empire Mint (building: dust)
• Sewer System (building: happiness)
• Alchemist's Furnace (strategic extractors)
• Open-Pit Mine (luxury extractors)
• Mercenary Market (units & heroes in market)
• Language Square (bribe & parley)

Notice that the last two technologies on that list don't require any industry to take advantage of, so they're great to slot in any time you feel your capital city isn't keeping up with the buildings you're unlocking. You'll want to get Language Square fairly early so your scouts can parley with all the villages they meet while exploring.



Once you have 9 technologies, you'll unlock era 2. That probably won't happen within the first 20 turns, though.



If you're blessed with a lot of industry, you can consider building a settler early (possibly right after the Founder's Memorial). Otherwise, aim to build your first settler and get them to your desired city location just in time to found your second city on turn 20, right after choosing your empire plan (having more cities increases the cost of empire plans, but once you've chosen a plan you get it for the next 20 turns no matter how many cities you build in that time).



Avoid spending dust to buyout construction (except in a true emergency)--it generally costs significantly more dust than the amount of industry it saves you, and you're going to be needing that dust soon. Building Borough Streets is not a high priority unless it gets you more anomalies (the first one costs twice as much as an era 1 building, reduces your happiness, and unless you get an anomaly probably isn't giving you more FIDS than an era 1 building).





Turns 20-40

In your first empire plan, you should probably buy as many abilities as you can afford (they're still cheap, so it's a good deal), but at least get the left-side plan (+3 dust per worker). The top plan (+20% unit cost reduction) can help you build settlers and defense, but the right plan (+20% science) is pretty nice, too. Don't get the bottom plan (+2 vision) unless you already have everything else. If you can get the tier 2 right-side plan (+33% building cost reduction), that would be awesome, but that's very unlikely except possibly for the Drakken.



If you didn't found your second city already, aim to found it exactly on turn 20, after paying for your first empire plan (don't forget to allow movement time). If you have enough luxury resources to activate boosters, do so before founding the city, as booster costs also increase based on city count. You should probably reassign your hero to your second city around this point--not only could the city use a quick boost, but your hero earns XP when the city completes construction projects, and your second city should have more stuff to build than your first at this point.



Either way, your third city--and probably your fourth, and maybe even your fifth--should be founded quickly afterward (before turn 30). Don't be afraid to have your new cities build some of the settlers--they'll probably be closer to your desired city locations, and the lower the city's population, the less food you're losing when you sacrifice a population for a settler.



All these cities are going to generate expansion disapproval. It's OK if your happiness level drops to "unhappy" (21-39), but try not to let it get lower than that. That may mean you need to avoid building Borough Streets (since they give -10 happiness), but look for opportunities to build them in ways that add a happiness-boosting anomaly to your city.



My default build order for a new city is: Mill Foundry, Seed Store, Sewer System, resource extractors, Public Library, Empire Mint. Right after the Mill Foundry is a good time to insert a settler if you need one. Note that advancing to era 2 will increase the cost of settlers, so it's nice to finish your settlers before crossing that boundary if practical.



The reason you got +3 dust per worker in your empire plan is that you're also going to need new heroes to govern all of these new cities; your capital hopefully should have several population and reduced urgency to finish more buildings by around this point, so you'll be switching some (possibly all) of its workers to dust so you can buy heroes on the market. If you don't have Mercenary Market yet, prioritize it. You want a hero in every city.



For this stretch of the game, you may want to reassign some workers (in any city) from industry to dust if they're not reducing the number of turns until the next building gets finished or you've run out of high-priority things to build (you want to take advantage of that empire plan while you've got it). Don't forget to save some dust for equipping your heroes (even if they're just governing a city, having decent equipment for them can help a lot if you get attacked there).



Once you finish the 9 techs from the previous list and reach the second era (which usually happens pretty soon after turn 20), the following era 2 techs are good to get (again, not necessarily in this order):

• Glory of Empire (building: influence) - you're going to want the empire plan with 33% building cost reduction on turn 40, which means you need to average at least 3 influence per city per turn, which is very unlikely with a bunch of new cities unless you get this (or assign workers to influence)
• Central Market (building: happiness) - founding all these cities is going to make your happiness drop
• Imperial Highways (roads) - trade routes give noticeable boosts to science & dust, and roads are strategically valuable
• Alchemical Alloys (tier 2 titanium & glassteel weapons) - these can give a very noticeable boost to unit damage
• Alchemical Armor (tier 2 titanium & glassteel armor & accessories) - the armor's dubious, actually, but there's some great accessories for both units and heroes
• Meritocratic Promotion (+2 army size, +1 accessory slot) - Larger armies are a huge tactical advantage (but only if you can build enough units to fill them)

You also may want to go back to era 1 and pick up Geomic Labs and (if you have a lot of rivers) Aquapulvistics--the era 1 buildings cost less than 1/3 the industry of era 2 buildings, so they're likely to be a better deal at this point in the game.



Note that you don't need to bother with tier 2 weapons/armor if you can get tier 3 from a quest (tier 3 titanium/glassteel equipment cannot be researched normally and is only available via quests).





Turn 40+

If you still have space to build more cities, building them right after your empire plan on turn 40 (or soon afterward) is a good time to do that, for the same reasons as turn 20.



For your second empire plan (and probably every other plan for the rest of the game), you want to get the 33% building cost reduction (right side tier 2) if at all possible; this will save you an enormous amount of industry, which, again, is probably your growth bottleneck. You don't necessarily need the +3 dust per worker by this point, but YMMV. If you have a little extra influence, 20% unit cost reduction (top tier 1) is handy to have. If you have a lot of extra influence (which you probably won't until your third empire plan on turn 60), the +25 happiness (bottom tier 2) can be a big boost (depending on your circumstances).



Borough Streets are likely to become important to your development around this point (now that you've got the early, cheap, efficient buildings out of the way). Don't forget that your districts will level up if there are 4 adjacent districts.



When you hit era 3, get the new resource extractors (both strategic and luxury) ASAP--notice that the luxury extractor tech is going to give you +1 resource on every luxury deposit (normally doubling your output), including the ones from earlier eras, so it can make a huge difference even before you get around to building the new extractors.

Expanding a little mshelley's post, Here's my proposal for CULTISTS opener



CULTISTS:



Turns 1-4. OK, Cultists only have ONE.SINGLE.CITY. That's All; Once you settle, you're done, so check thoroughly your starting area and don't mind waiting one or two turns before you decide where you settle. Settling too fast may be just game over for you. I'd say you should wait no longer than turn 3-4 to settle, but still, take a little more than other factions.



Where to Settle: This is a little tricky, since you both depend on FIDSI near you, and defense.



1-. Since Cultists need all FIDSI they can get, settling near anomalies (If you get some clustered together, you scored) is the base idea

2-. You need to settle in an open location. (Do NOT seetle your city core near water, it's almost Game Over, or an extreme penalty later on)

3-. Think about settling near a Minor Faction city.



Why you do NOT want to settle near water? Because of Cultist's High Seat of the Queen faction trait, that enables both city core and city districts reach level 3 (instead of 2 for all other factions). For a district/core to reach level 2, you must surround that core/district with FOUR other districts, and for the core/district to reach level 3, you must surround it with FOUR level 2 districts; that usually means you need to expand your cultist city in a circular shape. Sorry, no coastal cities for cultists.



Why would you be interested on settling near a minor faction city? Because once you convert a minor faction, that faction will generate units from time to time under your flag. As long as you settled near them, all units currently garrisoned in the minor faction city will automatically count as Reinforcements for you if someone decides to attack your capital... and having eight minotaur/hydra reinforcements along with your cultist forces, your hero and the capital's militia makes usually enemy factions think twice before attacking.



Turn 4-20.First of all, once you settle, assign your starting hero to the city.



Hero Upgrades: Cultists are extremely powerful governors since their Tier 1 Skill Impassioned Preacher grants them +1 on city per level (leveled up to three times), and their T3, T4 and T5 nets them +15% to either , or (again, leveled up to three times for a grand total of +45% to each). T1 preacher will grant faster development in all areas, and, most importantly, better gains per population unit, no matter where you place them.



Any other heroes you hire will always be commander heroes assigned to your armies, so be on lookout for heroes with useful army bonuses.



Tech Research: Concentrate on , and improvements and buildings. will be useful mainly for unkeep needs (and you will get decent amounts from the "beast market" later on) but not that interesting, and you will usually get enough just from the hero T1 skill and assigning some opulation:; you may need a little extra punch the first few turns for conversion purposes but that's it, by mid game you should only have pop working on influence gains if you need some extra income from time to time (1600 every 20t + diplomacy/conversion needs). Think of researching Fanatics early on, preachers are just that bad on battles. Cultists do not specialise in any particular resource, but tend to get more than average gains for all of them.



By Era 2, one of the most important researches is the shipyard if your world is island-based. You'll require a constant flux of units from both your capital and the converted villages. Just leave a small amount of "free" units at home (along with some garrisoned Cultists in your capital) for defense purposes. Your basic way to win is just to use Blitzkrieg tactics, one region after another. Go first for badly fortified cities, you may let the bigger ones (usually the capital) alone. Other factions depend on expansions to get enough resources while you do not, so you'll always win any 1v1 region battle.



City upgrades: Same as your tech research, you want to concentrate mainly on , and buildings; food is not that important since you will get lots of pop from pacification and conversions, but still more interesting optioon than dust, mainly used for unkeep costs. Try to expand FAST. Aproval usually isn't an issue since you don't build more cities and, once you start leveling up districts, they change their aproval penalty for an aproval bonus. Get some decent 4-6 cultist unit (Fanatics) army early, since your main way to win is militaristic (and in the early game, you don't get that many free units).



Empire Planning: A great advantage for cultists is that, since they can only own a single city, Empire Plans will always cost the minimum possible. You need 20 influence to enable T1 plans, 40 for T2 plans, 90 for T3 plans, and 250 for T4 plans. This means you need "only" 1600 influence every 20 turns to enable all empire plans for your faction (easily obtained mid game, where you can get 100+ influence a turn without even having pop working on influence gains). Still, you need some more influence for conversion and diplomacy purposes, so having some pop units working on influence is never a bad idea.



Try to reach 40 or 60 by turn 20. You will always want to enable +20% plan, Then if you got only 40 , your choice will depend on whether you found nearby factions or not. If there are nearby factions enable +20% unit production cost reduction (remember, other factions WILL expand while you cannot; if there's a nearby faction, you will want to hit them fast when their cities are not fortified, and thus, you want to pop units fast); in case there are not nearby factions or they'll take some time to come, go for +3 per opulation:. If you were able to get those 60 , enable all three of them.



Pacification and Conversion: Cultists have the unique option, once they pacify a minor faction, to Convert if for the cultist's cause. This will grant the Cultists several bonuses. You can convert to your cause already pacified cities from other factions, which will usually force that faction to "retake" the city.



1-. A converted faction will behave as a non-upgradeable, 7 tile city (faction city and the six tiles around) for the cultists, granting FIDSI out of those tiles.

2-. A converted faction will produce "minor faction" units from time to time under the cultists flag. This esentially grants cultists "free" units. Take note that those units have an unkeep cost you have to pay... but you're also allowed to sell those units (something very useful if you're in need of some fast-dust, if a city garrison is full and you don't have need of those units, just sell one for extra dust and let the city grow again). Minor faction cities behave as garrisons and can hold the same amount of units as your capital (so, if your military upgrades affect both size and experience gained. Minor faction units will level up if you own buildings that net exp per turn)

3-. A converted faction will grant your faction a small amount of luxury/strategic resources every turn as a token (very small gains, will be about 0.4 or so resources per city)



You should control your region(s) (your capital region and, at least, any neighboring regions) with roaming armies of converted units. You will see settlers and armies from other factions wandering around, and you do NOT want them to destroy your converted cities, so it's best to preempt them if possible (attacking other armies in neutral territory will usually only end up in a "scold" or "warning" from that faction, unless they want to start a war agains you... but you only lost free units while they lost several turns of production)



In case you spot a settler, you have two options; first of all, if you attack head on the settler will usually withdraw from battle (a unit that withdraws loses 50% of it's max health). This normally means a single army require three turns to destroy a fully healed settler (since all units except BL's regain some HP every turn). A trick here is to split your army into several, and UNCHECK reinforcemens, so you can attack the settler twice in a single turn. A better option, if you don't mind declaring war, is just to follow the settler until he founds a city, then immediately declare war and attack the city (if no other units, it's your army vs a single militia unit, and that's usually a 100% Win). You destroy the settler, a city AND get +1 Science/Prodution stockpile from the single city opulation: you just razed because of the Weapons of the Enemy faction trait).



NOTE: If you decide to pacify a minor faction city "by force" and convert that city, do NOT parley with any other cities in the same region (well, actually, you can parley, just do NOT complete their quest). There's a "bug" here; if you do complete a minor faction quest in a region, ALL cities in the region will be set to Pacified status... and that includes any already converted cites (so they will "deconvert", and you'll have to convert them again).



Turn 40+ You know the drill, keep expanding your city when available, convert factions, leave some units in their city garrisons as bullies and defenses if someone comes nearby and use the rest of those free units as cannon fodder to soften or destroy enemy armies/cities before you close in for the kill with cultist units. If you are lucky to convert some Nidjas, Haunts or other fast-moving units, set single units on autoscouting duties to reveal the map fast

Yorien wrote:


Why you do NOT want to settle near water? Because of Cultist's High Seat of the Queen faction trait, that enables both city core and city districts reach level 3 (instead of 2 for all other factions). For a district/core to reach level 2, you must surround that core/district with FOUR other districts, and for the core/district to reach level 3, you must surround it with FOUR level 2 districts; that usually means you need to expand your cultist city in a circular shape. Sorry, no coastal cities for cultists.

You only need 4 land hexes next to your city in order to reach level 2 for one of the Cultist quests. Other than that, your starting district isn't inherently special; you can build additional districts away from the water, thus making your starting district an edge district of your sprawling metropolis. There would have to be a compelling reason for you to start right up against the water, though. (I had one game where 2 anomalies were positioned just right so I could get both of them on turn 1 as long as I founded next to the water.)

Plumfairy wrote:
You only need 4 land hexes next to your city in order to reach level 2 for one of the Cultist quests. Other than that, your starting district isn't inherently special; you can build additional districts away from the water, thus making your starting district an edge district of your sprawling metropolis. There would have to be a compelling reason for you to start right up against the water, though. (I had one game where 2 anomalies were positioned just right so I could get both of them on turn 1 as long as I founded next to the water.)

That mainly depends on the actual landmass shape game has generated. On most "straight" scenarios, placing a coastal city core means it will have three water tiles and three land tiles, thus, the core won't be able to reach lv2 (usualy being the first tile that it reaches that level, and that will usually hinder your early game with cultists, and that alone can break the cultist's quest that requires your core to reach lv2). Of course, you may find locations where the map has generated Capes, and locations where the map has generated Gulfs; but I don't find ocean FIDSI gains to be very appealing for cultists.



In general terms you do NOT want the possibility to hinder your expansion by placing your core where it cannot reach it's full potential. Still, these are opening patterns, not something set in stone; if you "feel" placing a coastal core is a good location based on how your current map was generated, by all means go for it.



The only advantage I see on having a coastal core is if you want to ensure you can build Cargo Docks (researched at Era III) the same moment you research... and Cargo Docks are not that good for cultists. Yeah, you build "ocean roads" for trading... if you actually get someone to trade with since you cannot create internal routes; and the extra Industry per tile is not that powerful, there are better researches for Industry gains.

I'm not sure if that work:

"Settle right at turn 20 after you purchase empire plan."

If you do that your empire plan will be more expensive and as the result you will not get any empire plan at all. You have to settle at the turn 21.



Correct me if I'm wrong.

OK, time to give some ideas for the Ardent Mages faction



ARDENT MAGES



Ardent Mages are an interesting faction, they are well suited to both scientific victories (and sometimes score ones), but their units, if well built, can become the strongest in the game.



Turn 1-3: Like most factions, deploy your units, scout a little around and then chose a suitable location for your starting city. You should settle by turn 3 at most, and assign your Mage hero as governor.



Where to settle: This is actually important for mages, since they get an insane head start on gains (by mid game Vaulters will probably overthrow them, but Mages is a faction than can easily reach Era II before turn 20 on normal). Looking for some tiles with science is a great choice if you're both planing to go either for scientific score victory, but also if you want to go for military victories (And not becase of the units). is also important, not just because of unkeep costs, but because it's required to activate both pillars and spells, so you want to get some more than average dust than other factions like Wind Walkers or Cultists. is actually needed since you will build most things, AND you want your initial governor to get a couple of levels fast (thus, you want to build fast); is not that important, opulation: is useful, but mainly once you have built several improvements. The Mage's "head-start" is not very pop dependant. You'll probably want to settle in a location with a decent mix of , and tiles.



Turns 3-20:



Hero Skills: Here comes the dreaded scientific "head start" for ardent mages. Their faction T1 hero skill Renaissance Thinker nets ardent mages a flat +8 / +8 / +14. That's +30 per turn for three hero levels, and this skill alone coupled with one or maybe two science pillars usually allows you to research Era I techs in 2-3 turns, and the first few Era II techs in 5-6 turns. Reaching Era II before turn 20 (on normal speed) is extremely common. Once technologies become more and more expensive that initial flat bonus starts losing usefulness (Vaulters T1 hero skill will usually start giving them more science at this point), but reaching Era II fast is very valuable.



Tech Research: You have two choices here, you usually eiter want to start with a Public Library or a Mill Foundry, depending on your vs gains. Also, you actually want to research Atheshi Zealot more sooner than later, since it's one of the most powerful units in the game for Mages. Once you get the Library and the Foundry running, Empire Mint is a decent option so you can pop more pillars, but Language Square is also important in the low levels since your units are SQUISHY, and some specific minor factions (specially ones that hit decently hard) can become a pain. Pacifiying nearby villages that can become an issue is actually pretty important, better than wasting units fighting them.



NOTE: Be sure to QUEUE several researches. You will generare excess science almost every other turn, and you do not want a single point to go to waste early on, while the mages scientific "head start" lasts. Also, the same moment you settle (or one-two turns later at most), you should have enouh dust to pop out a science pillar hitting 4 city tiles, that's an extra 8/turn for 10 turns. Enabling two of those may be useful, but for every enabled pillar at the same time costs rank up, so unless you have some decent dust gains, setting only one and refreshing it is usually more than enough.



City Upgrades: You will usually follow the order you research, but is interesting to get a pair of Zealots somewhat early (retrofit them first granting them some extra base armor, and specially HP). At low levels and when bad equipped, Mages units are glass cannons, they hit awfully hard but are usually downed in a pair of hits (an unlucky crit fom some minor faction units can one-shot a zealot). That extra Industry from the Mill is important to have since your governor will level up faster to keep the scientific "head start" rolling, and to replenish some fallen units (will commonly happen when minor faction units start roaming and picking fights).



Empire plan: Like most factions, you should try to reach for 40 and one city w. a settler at turn 20, first enable the plan and then settle. You want to enable +20%, and either +3/opulation: if starting in a safe spot, or +20% unit production reduction costs if you find nasties nearby (be either other major factions, or heavy-hitting minor ones).



Turns 21-40:



Once you reach Era II, one of the first techs you want to research is Arcana of Authority, then immediately go for Dust Purifier if you feeling warlike, or get Dust Mechanics if you're going for a more static approach, then get some of the usual Era II researches (Glory of Empire, Shipyard and Meritocratic.



Military Approach: Why immediately research Dust Purifier after Authority if going militaristic?. Pillars and spells have 5 power levels. You get some levels from researches, and some from the Mages questline. Arcana of Authority nets you arguably the best spell in the game for mages: Incantation of Enervation, that STUNS an enemy unit for one turn. Once you get Dust Purifier and thus upgrade Enervation to level 2, it changes the single unit stun into a 7-tile AoE stun. And yes, it is as broken as it sounds. Even with the one battle-round cooldown between spell casts, using an AoE stun the first turn is usually more than enough to turn almost all but the worst of odds in your favor. Couple that with Zealots, that are RANGED units (stunned units still can counter when hit, still units can't counter what they can't reach) and you get the idea of how absurdly powerful this combo is.



As said before, Ardent Mage units are glass cannon... they hit absurdly hard but are squishy as hell (high attack, high damage, low defense, below than average HP). To give you an idea, the Warlock unit (Ardent Mages base) has 92 life, 51 attack, 20 defense and 52 damage. Necro foragers have 100 HP, 31 attack, 38 defense and 24 damage. Since 'locks have very little defense, will receive successful hits most of the time, but with that high attack they'll also land almost all hits successfully, and they pack more than double the forager's damage on hit (52 vs 24). And zealots follow the same path. Mage units hit absurdly hard but do not soak damage very well, but add stuns to the mix so zealots actually get "free" turns hitting enemies, and they obliterate enemy armies. Finally, AM units have a special ability called Ardent Fire. The more damaged they are, the more damage they deal.



To get extra info from Pillars and spells, I highly recommend to read nnwork's guides:



/#/endless-legend/forum/9-tips-tricks/thread/3706-dust-magic-and-you-the-potency-of-pillars

/#/endless-legend/forum/9-tips-tricks/thread/3726-dust-magic-and-you-the-power-of-words



Science approach: You want to research Dust Mechanics and some extra dust production, so you can pop more pillars at the same time. Dust Mechanics will increase the science pillar throughput from +2/tile to +5/tile, and, depending on how you expand your districts, will get usually 4 tiles worth per turn (+20/turn). While several city compositions may enhance the pillar throughput by enabling extra active tiles, you will usually get less city exploitations and a less amount of leveled up districts (and thus, less FIDSI gains from those compositions).



Turns 41+: You should have three cities by turn 40 (you may hold your third till you enable your second Empire plan) and be almost halfway to Era III. By this time you must decide if you want to keep comboing your wins (Zealots + AoE stun, you should keep one or two "tanky" units upfront; an army of 2 locks / 4 zealots, works decently well, but it's usually better if you can assimilate a tanky minor faction), or concentrate on expanding and getting most of your science pillars.



Take note that, at this point, Vaulters will usually start getting more science than you (their Alchemical Genius equals your Renaissance Thinker throughput at 3 districts - 4 when you learn lv3 -, and every extra district thy build in excess of 4 will net them an extra +6, plus their faction skill Knack for Knowledge on city exploitations) unless you really start popping pillars like crazy, so if you're going for a science victory you should do something about those guys. Dead Vaulters do not research, and other factions don't get as much science throughput as you unless they own several more regions than you.

myrec wrote:
I'm not sure if that work:

"Settle right at turn 20 after you purchase empire plan."

If you do that your empire plan will be more expensive and as the result you will not get any empire plan at all. You have to settle at the turn 21.



Correct me if I'm wrong.

On turn 20 you can execute your empire plan and then settle. It doesn't have to be a different turn, its only a matter of the order in which you do it. Same goes for luxury resources and strategic resources for the Vaulters.

My very limited experience at Normal and Hard with about 8-10 games that I played to turn 50-80 or so:



A. The one-unit armies split scouting isn't always better



I've had roaming armies spawn very eary, and multiple of them. IIRC they can pop up by turn 14 or 15. Losing a unit in the early phase is a big hit because it makes early pacification very dangerous—and you want to have those minor factions pacified. It's no fun having your cities go under siege all the time out of the blue. Not only that, certain parley quests require interaction with a hero, some even specify how many units you need. The additional movement points from the starting hero also helps the early scouting phase tremendously.



Unless you start with a hero that really has great capacities, I'd rather have them leading armies and making sure the weak starting units don't die. After one game (as Vaulters) where I lost both Marines to roaming armies and a badly wounded hero cowering in my capital, I don't split them anymore beyond the first 3 turns or so. My first 20 turns look like this:

[LIST=1]

Split up army and scout immediate surroundings.

Settle my capital city. Research into Language Square.

All units finish scouting the immediate coast that are already visible, then merge back into one army with the hero.

Scout in a more or less circular manner to find the next region I want to settle. Parley with anyone I see.

Capital switches to Settler as I hit size 3.

Hero+2+Settler goes to settle.

[/LIST]

It's not rare that by the time my second city is up, I already have 2 or even 3 minor factions pacified through parley. The 3 faction game had one minor faction rewarding me with Titanium which I immediately turned in to the next minor faction for pacification.



Having early parley also means it's very likely that you'll get a minor faction asking you to have your next empire plan take the economy direction. Or one that simply asks you to settle the region.



B. Land grab FTW



Getting that first settler out, settling that first city, growing population, getting those 3rd and 4th settles out and claiming more land is the goal of the early game. In a normal sized map with normal map difficulty and normal game difficulty, the AI factions can start just 1 empty region away from you. That means if you don't settle it, they will. In one of my earliest games, the turn after my first Settler crossed into the region I wanted to settle, it got settled by an AI. I turned around and headed towards the adjacent region, but 3 turns later it got settle by yet another AI.



On normal difficulty, unless you're playing Islands, it's not rare that you only get to settle 3 regions before you got boxed in by the AIs, although you're equally likely to be able to settle 4, at which point disapproval sings and you need those Sewer Systems or those sweet luxury resource boosts before you can settle new regions again.



Land grabbing in this game is intense because of the large granularity.



The moment you get your approval rating back a little, like over 30%, you want those 5th and 6th Settlers you've trained and escorted to their destinations to settle. In one game where I found myself all alone on an island and slacked on the settling, two different AI factions jumped me and settled the two remaining regions just as I got my new Settler out. It was at around turn 75-85 I think. They even skipped an unsettled island just off my coast to settle against me (or they didn't realize it existed).



So as long as approval ratings permit, one should definitely get the 5th or even 6th city settled asap, before turn 70. This means that if there are luxury resources, prioritize the extractor tech for luxury resources and build them to keep that early expansion machine going. On the other hand, if by turn 20 you're already down to 3 or even 2 regions that you can settle, you might as well prioritize the Mercenary Market tech to get those city governors working asap.



C. Look long and hard at the heroes you buy



Especially for your governors. You want at least level 3 BOOST capacities, ideally double boost. Things like Food Boost 2 + Science Boost 3. They are rare but not that rare. At the heroes listing in the marketplace, you'll see a magnifying glass listed by each hero. That's how you inspect them. The inspection window provides tooltips on all the capacities. You must also check their skill tree. Look for one that will let you obtain Cold Operator with minimum points wasted in army skills.



There are heroes with skill trees that will force you to invest in two or even three army skills just to get to Cold Operator. Unless, of course, you don't care about Cold Operator.



Similarly for army commanders. Look before you buy.

chikamichi wrote:
A. The one-unit armies split scouting isn't always better

Splitting armies tend to give a better advantage than clustering them together, but it's mainly dependand on the map shape (I like to set most of my generation options at Random/Chaotic). While each method has it's advantages, I prefer the split method.



ROAMING ARMIES: Yes, minor faction armies start roaming pretty soon, so keeping your units together may grant them some extra protection vs them.. but they usually don't start roaming at turn1... and base armies are cheap. If you split you cover much more terrain in the same amount of turns, and 2-3 successful ruin searches (30 to 50 a piece) nets you more than enough to buyout a unit that got chewed away.



SCOUTING: Splitting makes you cover much more distance than keeping units clustered, and you want to know ASAP what minor factions you have around (Sisters of Mercy are just annoying, but Hydras, Ogres, Minotaurs can be a pain), and what's the best region to settle afterwards. Also, splitting allows you to uncover and search more runs in a single turn (as I said, if one of your starting units gets chewed after getting 2-3 successful searches, that unit usually has paid for itself)



HERO: You won't probably get into fight with the heroes the first turns, and, until you actually get Language Square and reach a minor faction city, your hero will only get experience from ruin searches. Most starting heroes tend to have a resource capacity that only worlks if they're assigned as governors... and that special power works from turn 1. Those capacities usually come in three shapes:



Flat bonus: Your hero gets a big flat bonus to a single resource (If I recall, +6/+9/+12, or +2/+4/+6:ep, based on the capacity level

Pop bonus: Your hero gets a small bonus to one resource based on the opulation: of the city the hero is assigned to. (If I recall, +1/+2/+3 per opulation: based on the capacity level, I think there is no capacity)

Level bonus: Your hero gets a fixed bonus to a single resource multiplied by the numbers of levels that hero has. This capacity only has one level.



And there are several other capacities like Productivity or faction capacities like Slavery, that grant special passive bonuses when heroes are assigned as governors. If your starting hero gets one of this capacities that alone usually makes setting them as governor a much better choice. If I have to chose between keepng my first units a little safer, or a +9/turn because my starting hero got "Flat Science lv2" and a "+1 on tiles" because is a Broken Lord hero, it's a no brainer for me; you want my preacher raw or well-done?.



I should only stick with my hero around if he/she has no capacities and if his T1 "faction" skill is not that good to keep it as a governor early on (for example, a Drakken hero with no capacity, when I settled away from rivers). You will get more levels early on by setting heroes as governors just by building something anyways.



PARLEY: While this is actually important, the only diference is that if you parley with a hero that hero gets a small amount of XP from the parley. You can parley with a sngle roaming unit without a single issue. And, since heroes can be reassigned every few turn (5 if I recall), if a quest requires you to do something with a hero you can reassing your hero for that quest (reassign instant teleport FTW) then send him back to the city few turns later. If that minor faction that gave you a quest one turn ago decides to pop a roaming army and attack you the next turn, will do and attack you no matter what.

chikamichi wrote:
B. Land grab FTW

While Land Grab is important, at least on normal dificulty is not interesting to settle ASAP. The ONLY faction you want to use Land Grab tactics without scouting is the Roaving Clans, since you can get hold on the region fast, then Setseke Ho! to a better location later on; for all other factions (but cultists, of course) scouting and finding the best location benefits the late game than expanding too early in bad spots. Dependng on the victory you want to achieve, and the map sice, 3-4 regions are more than enough for many non-militaristic wins, specially when settled correctly.



Some AI factions try to nab as many regions as possible, usually rushing settlers and sometimes shipyards... but they don't scout for the best locations. I've seen with my own eyes (cultist faction... was just tailing an enemy settler so I could get some free stockpiles from an immediately-to be-razed 100 armor city) settlers establishing on coastlines right after disembarking without even scouting first for better FIDSI locations in the same region.



Several times, AI doesn't "understand" that settling too fast hinders them more than helps. Settlers demand all food generated in a city as part of their production cost, and that means that the city will not grow up for several turns. If they settle afterwards in a bad spot, that city gains will not pay until several improvements are built. Also, AI factions must also beware from roaming armies same as you (I've seen roaming armies immediately sieging a recently established city).



Scouting early (I tend to consider my two starting units as expendable) allows you to know what AIs you're playing against and how far they are, so you know If you can take your time or if you need to expand faster (and control possible enemy settlers being built, having two unit armies on the lookoout for astray settlers can hinder enemy factions right from scratch)

Time for Necros today:



NECROPHAGES:



Necros are Auriga's Zerg race, they expand, they feed, they destroy other races and minor factions, they dont dialog, they don't bribe, they can... ask for Truce? The hell?, please, Amplitude, fire the guy that coded that, thanks.



Necros are the most aggressive faction in all of Auriga, followed by the cultists. The fact that they cannot research a single diplomacy option means the same moment you encounter another faction you're already calculating where are the finest cuts of that ambassador. Still, they're allowed to ask for Truces if the several wars they'll embark on start going bad.



Still, since they're a faction so aggressive, Necros should be able to Declare War at no cost unless breaking a Truce. Amplitude, think of it.



Turn 1-3: You get the drill, deploy your units, scout a little around and then chose a suitable location for your starting city. You should settle by turn 3 at most and assign your hero as governor



Where to settle: Since their faction penalty Agriculturaly challenged, settling near tiles is useless unless the tile is an anomaly or a rich tile with more than 1 . Necros are not vegetarian, they don't plant crops and water them. is arguably the most important tile type for Necros, followed by a mix of and . Necros have to build buildings spawn units fast, since they will have more unit loses than most other factions in the game. Most of the food they'll get early on will have to come from other "sources". Thus, concentrate mainly on , with some and as secondary.



Turns 3-20:Ok, you settled and your Necros have started to stratch your monitor right away, trying to reach your juicy meat. BTW, they already got your dog; don't waste time looking for Sparky.



Hero Skills: Before Necros start feeding on your arm, you need to give them some food, and curiously, Necros can actually get more food than most other races, without the need of even setting opulation: on food duties. Their T1 Hero Skill, Necrotic Agriculture, nets your city +8/+8/+14. That's +30 for three hero levels, more than enough to get some cocoons to start spawning dron (...uh, sorry, wrong game). But in fact, that skill alone nets you more than enough food for all your city needs, at least for the first few opulation:. Their T2 Slave Driver grants you a +12%/+12% reduction on unit costs, very useful since you'll want to pop many more units than with other races. That production cost reduction will usually mean you'll get your units fully equipped (with iron/steel) for the same cost other races must pay to get their units almost naked. Finally, their T3 skill Cadaverous Pesticides, nets Necros a +15%/+15%/+15% on the city. Coupled with other ways Necros have to get food, it's an enormous amount of food.



Tech Research: Seed Storage and Mill Foundry are the two most common choices. Foundry will grant you even more , and the "Meat" storage is one of the basic buildings that will help you with your initial needs. After that, you should get your Necrodrone rolling, then go for either Open Pit mine, Marketplace or Advanced Alloys/Armor, Necros start with furnace researched, so check if you have titanium/glassteel on your starting region. If you can pop a mine early, your Necros will become waaaay more scary early on. After that, Sewer system and Public library are the most common choices. Military science is interesting since if you keep units on hold, they'll level up when you build the Cantina.



City Upgrades: After the classic Founder's Memorial, Seed Storage and Mill Foundry are your basic buildings... unless you're feeling hungry already. If your region happens to contain a Glassteel or Titanium extractors (remember, you start with Furnace researched), pushing that extractor several places up on your queue on will allow to stockpile some titanium/glassteel for your units to be retrofitted. Two foragers may not seem much at first glance... but two titanium armed foragers at turn 10 and a third one on production coming your way are scary as hell. Glassteel is not that useful (you want to mainly pump your damage, since Necro units have very high initiative, so Titanium is usually the way to go), but still a good increase. Also, researching the advanced weaponry/armor, grants your gobernor heroes access to the T1 titanium/glassteel trinkets (+1 or +1 per every opulation: on city, and you'll probably want to equip both). After that... you want to start expanding with Burroughs. First of all, Necros can build one Burrough per opulation: (other factions need two opulation: per Burrough); second, Cellulose Mutation faction trait makes Districts cheaper (in terms, you finish them faster than other factions), and third, faster districts means more exploitation, and faster level 2 core/districts (level 2 core/districts increase tile output by 50% and change the -10 penalty for a +5 bonus). As always, you should have a settler ready at turn 20.



Empire planning: While you do not depend that much on , you should at least reach for 20 (40 is somewhat dificult but doable). You should first enable +20% unit production reduction cost, and if you got the extra influnence, either the +20% or +3/opulation:. Since Necros get opulation: decently fast despite their feeding problems early on, dust may actually be a better option so you can hire a hero faster.



Turns 21-40: It's time to start bringing large ammounts of food home. Along with your governor hero bonus and the buildings, Necros actually get lots of food from "pacified" villages (AKA cattle herds) so you want to parl... (wait, Necros do NOT parley) er... "pacify" them with your troops, then reconstruct those villages, since you "quadra dip" from them:



1-. All Necro heroes have the Slavery governor hero capacity, this capacity grants a city +1/opulation: per every pacified village in the region. Since there can be up to three villages in a single region, you may get up to +3 per opulation:. And more food means more population, and more population means more food...

2-. Remember that every time you "pacify" and reconstruct a village, one opulation: is sent to your city.

3-. All "pacified" villages grant that region city +2/turn (because of the Cull the Herd faction trait). As the tooltip, says, "There are many different ways to pay taxes...". I specially like Sisters of Mercy "taxes", since years of hard training and healthy feeding habits make them taste like Kobe meat. Nidyas taste like chicken.

4-. Every unit you kill (as long as you win the battle) will net you one cadaver. Every 8 cadavers will net you one stockpile (similar to the stockpiles generated with the Era III Unskilled Labor research). You may use those stockpiles on the Empire Management screen to instantly grant one of your cities a decent ammount of . This is specially useful when establishing a new city since it usually nets them extra opulation: almost immediately.



You want all villages in your conquered regions immediately pacified, but sometimes is interesting to let villages in nearby regions alone, so they generate what I like to call "roaming food stockpiles" from time to time. You can easily have one or two, fully equiped, garrisoned units in all your cities and may send them on "harvest duties" when one of those roaming armies get close.



You'll want most of your opulation: working on , and maybe some on ; poping units and buildings fast is the Necro way. Once you reach Era II, Meritocratic Promotion should almost always be your first choice. Necro units are best in large numbers, and thius this is the most picked upgrade. Shamefully, the researches are not that good, since they're mostrly terrain-dependant, but you may give them a go if you settled somewhere that can benefit from those researches. Shipyard (island maps) and Alloys are the next choices, ad, most interestingly, Imperial Highways, since they grant decent bonuses between your cities, and allow you to travel faster between them. Glory of Empire will start netting you some decent influence for your empire needs.



Once you reach Era II empire plans, there are several useful bonuses you want to get. First of all, the +30% attack on your units is too tasty to ignore; also, the new +33% building production cost reduction is also tasty, but you'll usually have to drop the T1 economy plan to reach it unless you actually farmed some decent .



Turn 40+: By this time you should already be at war with your most nearby factions; take note that every region you take will become a hit for your aproval, so sometimes is best to fully gain control over it and then just raze it down. Just place some cheap unit on queue so the "non-production" message doesn't annoy you every single turn (yes, you may disable the message... but you want it to pop on your active cities in case you forgot to queue) and once city control reaches 100% after a few turns, raze that pile of rubbish. You only want to keep cities with decent ammounts of population and good FIDSI gains, since you'll need some time to get them out of Rebellion status (Rebellion status gives a large hit to FIDSI gains). Shamefuly, only Cultists can gain 100% control and autoraze the cities in one single turn... other factions should also be allowed to raze cities before fully in control.

I tried what you posted with the broken lord bu i can't seem to make it work i usually lose my heroes and first unit vs the first group of monster because only the hero does damages 50-60 the other reliably hit for 0 or 5-10 damages... are the crusader bugged???



plus the increased cost of populations slow them down a lot

Vanilla stalwarts (crusaders) just kind of suck. Sometimes I retrofit them into some armor on the first turn.



I almost always use my hero for individual scouting. He can net a ruins every other turn or so, which is hard to beat with economic development. XP progression between scouting duty and city duty is pretty similar. I'll freely reassign him for any quests-- including battles-- if the reward is good enough.



I send my units out to scout, but try to maintain concentric circles rather than just shooting off willy nilly. Near turn 15 I start calling them home. Mercenary market is nice if I don't act soon enough: retreat, then sell the unit. Or, if there's reason, assign the hero; hero+stalwart can take on two mobs, but nothing else until they heal.

First thing I do is get rid of the sword they are given and get the two handed version for a bit more damage

Kanjejou wrote:
I tried what you posted with the broken lord bu i can't seem to make it work i usually lose my heroes and first unit vs the first group of monster because only the hero does damages 50-60 the other reliably hit for 0 or 5-10 damages... are the crusader bugged???



plus the increased cost of populations slow them down a lot

Stalwarts is probably the most defensive starting unit in the game (Along with Drakkenlings), they're not meant to deal much damage unless they DW. They're meant to stay there and take hits for several turns, not to get kills themselves. Their base dmg is just 22, and with their low attack, they're somewhat prone to fumbles (50% damage dealt) until you give them some equipment. Still, their shield gives them a lot of defense, you they'll also receive less damage than other units (more fumbles and misses against them).



Also, you must chose if you buyout pop or you buyout buildings. Some fast, initial pop is nice (3-4opulation: by turn 20 on your first city), but you also want to get that mint rolling, and several other buildings (and maybe extra units). You're not rich until midgame if you go on a dust-based approach, but later on it pays for itself (yesterday I finished a normal game vs AI... let's say I could buyout half of the buildings for a new city the same turn I captured one, I was more limited by strategic/luxury resoources than by dust, even with several BL heroes with Mining Authority...).



BL's tend to have more than average opulation: (it usually is the "cheapest" thing you can buy most of the time), but they don't have an ahead start on population. If your city gains are small, maybe it's not interesting to buy opulation: (I won't pay 200 to get 1opulation: that will be assigned to 4/turn duties, but I will buy 1opulation: to assign it to a 13/turn duties)



opulation: is used for two things. To assign it to resource duties, and to enable burroughs to grant your city more exploitation. If resource duties is not that good, and there are no interesting exploitations nearby, is best to just save for buildings. But if there are nearby anomalies or rich tiles that you can reash in one or two expands, then you may buy opulation: so you can expand fast and go for them. Measure costs and winnings.



Remember that these are not rules set in stone, but starting patterns, same as scouting and assigning governors, and the like.

natev wrote:
I almost always use my hero for individual scouting. He can net a ruins every other turn or so, which is hard to beat with economic development. XP progression between scouting duty and city duty is pretty similar. I'll freely reassign him for any quests-- including battles-- if the reward is good enough.

If you happen to find ruins. Governors are sure-shots most of the time (specially if they get a governor skill, that alone may give you half of the resource type your empire generates the first turns), since you'll keep building no matter what, every turn.



Roaming XP gains will usually be on par, but you're dependant on actually finding those ruins and villages. I don't usually mind those small amounts of XP (I recall 6xp for ruins and 4xp for parleys maybe?) since I can do the same with the two base units.



It's mainly a matter of chosing between extra resources early on, or some XP and (maybe) a more safe scouting (depends if you assign the hero to one of the armies, or if you perform a three-way scout with the hero and the starting units)

natev wrote:
I send my units out to scout, but try to maintain concentric circles rather than just shooting off willy nilly. Near turn 15 I start calling them home. Mercenary market is nice if I don't act soon enough: retreat, then sell the unit. Or, if there's reason, assign the hero; hero+stalwart can take on two mobs, but nothing else until they heal.

Well, the basic scouting usually doens't send your units too far away, you want mainly to check what do you have around (let's say, one, maybe two regions away) and to spot a suitable location for your first expansion (never send a settler to an unexplored region), so unless one of your units get's stuck in a OMR spree (you know... "oh, look, there's One More Ruin a little farther, let's check it out and then... oh , look, another ruin."). You mainly check your nearby borders so you can start planing your playstyle for that game ("Nobody home, I can play safe a little longer" - "Got some lizzard-looking weirdos two regions away, but seem friendly" - "Why are those insect-like creatures one region away looking for me as if I were their next meal?")